Infants and other incontinent individuals wear absorbent articles such as diapers to receive and contain urine and other body exudates. Absorbent articles function both to contain the discharged materials and to isolate these materials from the body of the wearer and from the wearer's garments and bed clothing. Disposable absorbent articles having many different basic designs are known to the art. For example, U.S. Pat. Re. No. 26,152, entitled "Disposable Diaper" issued to Duncan and Baker on Jan. 31, 1967, describes a disposable diaper which has achieved wide acceptance and commercial success.
In order to provide better fit and reduced leakage about the leg of the wearer, absorbent articles have been provided with elastic leg closures. U.S. Pat. No. 3,860,003, entitled "Contractable Side Portions For Disposable Diaper", issued to Kenneth B. Buell on Jan. 14, 1975, describes an elasticized leg cuff disposable diaper which has achieved wide acceptance and commercial success. U.S. Pat. No. 4,743,241 issued to Igaue et al. on May 10, 1988, describes a disposable diaper having a wide pre-stretched elastic leg closure designed to provide lower pressure on the skin to reduce skin marking along the leg of the wearer as well as a high tension for reduced leakage.
However, it has been found that absorbent articles having elastic leg closures still have a tendency to gap or be too tight about the leg during use. As the wearer goes from a standing position to a sitting position, changes occur in the body measurements, particularly in the hips and buttocks, of the wearer thereby causing the diaper to have to change its dimensions to accommodate the changes in the wearer's dimensions. Conventional disposable diapers are made of nonelastic cover materials which are unable to elastically expand to accommodate these wearer changes and have elastic leg features unable to fully elastically expand without placing undue pressure on the wearer's legs. Thus, the elastic leg features and the materials making up the elastic leg features are unable to dynamically elastically expand to accommodate these body dimensions as the wearer moves. As a result, the elastic leg feature tends to gap away from the leg causing an increased likelihood of leakage or undue pressure may be applied to the leg that can cause skin marking.
Thus, it would be advantageous to provide an absorbent article having elastic leg features that provide better fit.
Therefore, it is an object of the present invention to provide an absorbent article having dynamic fit about the leg of the wearer.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide an absorbent article having an elastic leg feature that provides sustained dynamic fit as the wearer moves.
These and other objects of the present invention will be more readily apparent when considered in reference to the following description and when taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.